The Story of the Vampire, L (Completed | Featured )

Part 3 - In Bed and at Board

If I told Laurent, "I'm not supposed to be here," he would take my face in his hands and incline his forehead against mine, and whisper to me softly.

"You must be here. You are fragile. You must be here. You are fragile." He would say that and nod at me, nod at me, nod at me, so I stopped saying it. But I did not feel fragile, and after a few weeks, I began to wander out on my own, and I would find him sitting in the long grass, or occasionally practicing his footwork with a sword.

He had two sorts, a hand-and-a-half, or epee-bastarde, and a long, tapered estoc, for piercing. When he practiced swords he wore a long cotton chemise, through which, in the waning light of evening, I could see the shape of his body. I never saw him use them, but these swords were not well-kept, and I saw the old blood hiding at the straight crossguards.

I was not familiar with his footwork, but it seemed vaguely military, though elegant. His body in general in bed and at board was loose and flexible, but he had himself well in command when he thought himself unobserved. I would stand in the shadow of the roof and watch him practicing. I liked him in command. I wanted him in command of me. And for awhile, that was enough.

If he caught me watching, he might ask me, "What are you curious of?" as he passed, skin flushed from the waning sunlight, and I would say "What did you trade to get these swords? Their quality is good." We often spoke in familiar patterns. I think that he liked to know what to say.

"Do you know much about swords?" he might ask.

"I know a little about most things one can buy."

"I did not buy them," he told me once. "The trade was well weighted towards the other end."

And so I knew that these were the swords of dead men, and that the world of dead men was his own world.

I was not unfamiliar with that world myself, as all young men then were accustomed to the idea of killing at the right time and for the right name, and killing a soldier of England did not bother me much in and of itself. I was also not unfamiliar with intimacy, and its many forms. But his bed was entirely new to me, and that, also, was enough to keep me there. As much as I would like to say, now that he has passed, that I fell in love with him, or was able to comfort him in some way, to claim it would be to parrot falsehoods. There are enough parrots among us.

He would say to me things like, "I am the most sorrowful wretch in the world," and "Give me justice, draw your blade on me, for I shall bend to it," but these were well-practiced things, which worked on Dasius but not on me. His true mood was only what he was when he was alone, and this I gathered by peeking at him when he was at repose.

Most evenings, he would rise early, at the beginning of the day's decline, and head out on his own. I don't believe for a moment that he disliked horses, or anything of the kind. He kept the horse boarded so that Dasius would not be able to track his coming and going. Around midnight he would return, and I thought he must be going to Rouen or some other smaller city, and he would put the horse up quite lathered from the journey, whispering and cooing at its trembling withers. Then he would come home soundlessly, and slip into bed with Dasius, who he always insisted to me was his ward, and no lover.

Perhaps there is truth in that or perhaps there isn't. He had reason to say it to me, and also no reason at all. What did I care about Dasius, when it was plain to me that I had surpassed him in Laurent's affection? And had I really? Were we ever competing for it? It seems to me now, and seemed to me then, that neither of us had much power in inspiring him to a true passion. Dasius and I would play whist together, or "Rough and Honours" as it was known then, us two and two ghosts as the south and the east to round out the table. Mostly we would play against each other, though sometimes we two played against the ghosts. We played it endlessly. Sometimes if the game was very hard fought, he would whisper in acid, "You are cheating. Control your ghost," and I would whisper, "I cannot control him. The ghost is me."